Roy Fredrick wrote:Perhaps this is a "dumb" question, but can you explain the usage and variation of θυ θς θε θν θω it looks like "υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ" should be "of the θεοῦ" and like 1Jn 4:12 it should be "the θεὸς"? or is it just because of the nominitive, dative genitive postioning? Col 3:16-17 θς θω

It's not altogether clear what you're asking. θυ θς θε θν θω are, I think, abbreviations seen in manuscripts for the different case-forms of the noun θεός: θυ = θεοῦ (genitive form), θς = θεός (nominative form), θε = θεέ (vocative form), θν = θεόν (accusative form) and θω = θεῷ (dative form). This is a matter of abbreviating very commonly recurring nouns by noting only the first and last characters of the word.

Different printed GNT texts use different conventions; some start any new sentence with an upper-case letter; others will use upper-case letters only for proper nouns. You cited 1 Ti 3:16 in a text using the first convention. In your citation of Mark 14.32 in a text that capitalizes the proper name Γεθσημανί. Then Καθίσατε is capitalized because it contains the text of the command indicated by λέγει. One might wish that all printed texts of the GNT used a consistent formula for upper and lower-case characters, but it's not the case.

It really does look like you're approaching the Greek text of the New Testament from the outside, i.e. with all sorts of reference works, and trying to figure out the Greek with the assistance of dictionaries, parsing guides, and translations. The question is: have you started ever to learn Greek from the inside -- working through a standard beginning Greek text?